It's Easier to Understand How TVs Work When You Watch Them at 380,000 Frames Per Second

Despite feeling like ancient, antique technology at this point, the monstrously-heavy CRT television you grew up with was an engineering marvel, as the Slow Mo Guys reveal by filming an old-school TV at an astonishing 380,000 frames per second.

At that frame rate you’re able to clearly see the electron beam slowly scanning its way across the screen, top to bottom and left to right, exciting the phosphors that create each individual glowing pixel. At full speed the process is much faster than the human eye can discern, but it’s fascinating to see it in action at extreme slow-mo speeds.

The Slow Mo Guys also turned their high-speed cameras on a modern, flatscreen TV in this video, revealing the impossibly tiny pixels that are all but invisible to the naked eye. But when it comes to capturing awesome slo-mo footage, it’s the old-school CRT that delivers better results here. [YouTube]